PSU-AAUP Executive Council has voted to fully endorse and sign on to AAUP National's statement:
by AAUP National
February 27, 2023
The AAUP, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) issued the following statement condemning the introduction of Florida HB 999. Download the full statement here.
With the introduction of HB 999, the Florida legislature—at Governor DeSantis’s urging—has doubled down on its attacks on academic freedom with a bill that would effectively silence faculty and students across the ideological spectrum and purge whole fields of study from public universities. This bill substitutes the ideological beliefs of those in power for the freedom that is necessary for colleges and universities to serve the common good and function as intellectual centers where young people succeed and where the ideas that drive our country’s economy and democracy are ignited.
Florida’s HB 999 would destroy academic freedom, tenure, shared governance, and university independence in the state’s public higher education system. The bill would place control of core curricula and institutional mission statements entirely in the hands of political appointees. It would limit or ban students’ ability to pursue certain majors or areas of study. Simply put, it would make Florida’s colleges and universities into an arm of the DeSantis political operation.